Marvin J. Ashton Quotes

If we could look into each other’s hearts and understand the unique challenges each of us faces, I think we would treat each other much more gently, with more love, patience, tolerance, and care.

Be the one who nurtures and builds. Be the one who has an understanding and a forgiving heart one who looks for the best in people. Leave people better than you found them.

Perhaps the greatest charity comes when we are kind to each other, when we don’t judge or categorize someone else, when we simply give each other the benefit of the doubt or remain quiet. Charity is accepting someone’s differences, weaknesses, and shortcomings; having patience with someone who has let us down; or resisting the impulse to become offended when someone doesn’t handle something the way we might have hoped. Charity is refusing to take advantage of another’s weakness and being willing to forgive someone who has hurt us. Charity is expecting the best of each other

Greatness is best measured by how well an individual responds to the happenings in life that appear to be totally unfair, unreasonable, and undeserved.

The best and most clear indicator that we are progressing spiritually and coming unto Christ is the way we treat other people.

None of us need one more person bashing or pointing out where we have failed or fallen short. Most of us are already well aware of the areas in which we are weak. What each of us does need is family, friends, employers, and brothers and sisters who support us, who have the patience to teach us, who believe in us, and who believe we’re trying to do the best we can, in spite of our weaknesses. What ever happened to giving each other the benefit of the doubt? What ever happened to hoping that another person would succeed or achieve? What ever happened to rooting for each other?

Victories in life come through our ability to work around and over the obstacles that cross our path. We grow stronger as we climb our own mountains.

How damaging is a habit that permits faultfinding, character assassination, and the sharing of malicious rumors! Gossip and caustic comments often create chains of contention.

Sometimes when family members least deserve love, they need it most. Love is not appropriately expressed in threats, accusations, expressions of disappointment, or retaliation. Real love takes time, patience, help, and continuing performances.

Do not doubt your abilities. Do not delay your worthy impressions. With God's help, you cannot fail. He will give you the courage to participate in meaningful change and purposeful living.

As children of God we are somebody. He will build us, mold us, and magnify us if we will but hold our heads up, our arms out, and walk with him. What a great blessing to be created in his image and know of our true potential in and through him! What a great blessing to know that in his strength we can do all things!

Tact is rubbing out another's mistakes, not rubbing them in.

The difference between those who are committed and those who are not is the difference between the words want and will.

Being on time to appointments and meetings is a phase of self-discipline and an evidence of self-respect. Punctuality is a courteous compliment the intelligent person pays to his associates.

Worthiness is a process, and perfection is an eternal trek. We can be worthy to enjoy certain privileges without being perfect.

When a mother asked her small child how he fell out of bed, he answered, "Because I wasn't in far enough." Let me just say in passing that it has been my experience that most people who fall out of the Church do so because they were not in far enough.

Lying damages others. Lying subtly permits us to destroy ourselves as we are caught in the snare and shatter our own self-image and credibility. Freedom from deceit and lying improves self and gives all of us peace of mind.

Do not allow yourselves to be made to feel inadequate or frustrated because you cannot do everything others seem to be accomplishing. Only you and your Father in Heaven know your needs, strengths, and desires. Around this knowledge your personal course must be charted and your choices made.

Good cheer is a state of mind or mood that promotes happiness or joy... With God’s help, good cheer permits us to rise above the depressing present or difficult circumstances. It is a process of positive reassurance and reinforcement. It is sunshine when clouds block the light.

You owe it to yourself to keep fit. No matter how busy or how involved you are, you should have some type of physical program to keep the body in tune.

If we would know true love and understanding one for another, we must realize that communication is more than a sharing of words. It is the wise sharing of emotions, feelings, and concerns. It is the sharing of oneself totally.

As adults, if our top priorities are constantly directed toward the acquisition of more and better worldly goods, it will not take long to increase our love in those directions. The purchase of a larger house or a nicer car or a more expensive boat may cause us to sacrifice our resources and develop an unwise love for these symbols of success and pleasure. We learn to love that which we serve, and we serve that which we love.

Set your goals-without goals you cannot measure your progress. But don’t become frustrated because there are no obvious victories. Remind yourself that striving can be more important than arriving.

We ... tend to evaluate others on the basis of physical, outward appearance: their "good looks," their social status, their family pedigrees, their degrees, or their economic situations. The Lord, however, has a different standard by which he measures a person. When it came time to choose a king to replace King Saul, the Lord gave this criteria to his prophet Samuel: "Look not on his countenance, or on the height of his stature; ... for the Lord seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart."

Over the years I have learned that when I need answers to deal with crises, people, and issues, I must go to God. God will help us in everything we do if we stay in tune and if we will call on him. We must each plan our future with him in our homes, our families, and our relationships with others. If we make him our senior partner, our lives can be successful.

The direction in which we are moving is more important than where we are at the moment. Goal setting should cause us to stretch as we make our way.

A man must rise by his own efforts and walk by faith.

Being of good cheer makes it possible for us to turn all of our sunsets into sunrises.

Greatness is best measured by how well an individual responds to the happenings in life that appear totally unfair, unreasonable, and undeserved. Sometimes we are inclined to put up with a situation rather than endure. To endure is to bear up under, to stand firm against, to suffer without yielding, to continue to be, or to exhibit the state or power of lasting.

I am acquainted with a wife and mother who is chained securely at the present time to a life-style of murmuring and criticism. She is the first to point out faults in her husband or to repeat neighborhood gossip. How damaging is a habit that permits fault-finding, character assassination, and the sharing of malicious rumors! Gossip and caustic comments often create chains of contention. These chains may appear to be very small, but what misery and woe they can cause!

One of the great tragedies of life, it seems to me, is when a person classifies himself as someone who has no talents or gifts. When, in disgust or discouragement, we allow ourselves to reach depressive levels of despair because of our demeaning self-appraisal, it is a sad day for us and a sad day in the eyes of God. For us to conclude that we have no gifts when we judge ourselves by stature, intelligence, grade-point average, wealth, power, position, or external appearance is not only unfair but unreasonable.

Everything is given by God. All talent, creativity, ability, insight, and strength comes from him. In our own strength we can do nothing.

It is a happy day when we come to know that with God's help, nothing is impossible for us.

Someone has said, “A friend is a person who is willing to take me the way I am.” Accepting this as one definition of the word, may I quickly suggest that we are something less than a real friend if we leave a person the same way we find him.

Leave people better than you found them.

The family as an institution today is beset on all sides. Conflicts within the family are critical and often damaging. Contention puts heavy strain on stability, strength, peace, and unity in the home. There is certainly not time for contention in building a strong family.

Sometimes when family members least deserve love, they need it the most.

Some think the only way to get even, to get attention or advantage, or to win is to bash people. This kind of behavior is never appropriate. Oftentimes character and reputation and almost always self-esteem are destroyed under the hammer of this vicious practice.

The practice of thrift is not outdated. We must discipline ourselves to live within our incomes even if it means going without or making do. The wise person can distinguish...between basic needs and extravagant wants. Some find budgeting extremely painful, but I promise you, it is never fatal.

Some of us are inclined to look to the weaknesses and shortcomings of others in order to expand our own comfort zone.

Give no time to finding fault of criticism.

Certainly one of our God-given privileges is the right to choose what our attitude will be in any given set of circumstances. We can let the events that surround us determine our actions-or we can personally take charge and rule our lives, using as guidelines the principles of pure religion. Pure religion is learning the gospel of Jesus Christ and then putting it into action. Nothing will ever be of real benefit to us until it is incorporated into our own lives.

Blessed is he or she who avoids being offended.

Wise is the man who says what needs to be said, but not all that could be said.

We need to remove unworthy from our vocabulary and replace it with hope and work.

We live in a complex world. There are many forces calling out, 'Love me.' A sure way to set our guidelines for that which we choose to serve and learn to love is to follow the admonition of Joshua: 'As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.

In times of hurt and discouragement, it may be consoling for all of us to recall that no one can do anything permanently to us that will last for eternity. Only we ourselves can affect our eternal progression.

Peace is a blessing that comes to those who trust in God. It is established through individual righteousness. True personal peace comes about through eternal vigilance and constant righteous efforts.

God knows the feelings in every human heart. He can soften sorrow and lead when there seems to be no light. Prayer can give guidance and confidence. It reminds us that no one need be alone in this world. If all else fails, remember, God and one other person can be a family.

Often parents communicate most effectively with their children by the way they listen to and address each other. Their conversations showing gentleness and love are heard by our ever-alert, impressionable children.